CISM Exam Provisional Pass November 13

ay092017

I took the CISM exam today and have provisionally passed!

Preparation:
I only used the CISM QAE database and started study 30 days prior to the exam.
Dashboard says I studied 53 hours with 90% average. I was scoring 60% when I started.
I focused on the underlying reasoning behind each correct answer and also why the wrong answers were wrong.
In my studies I attempted 5600 questions and I am sure I got to see every question at least twice and finished with no incorrect answers.
Final weekend I took full practice exam 4 times scoring 93-98.

Test Day:
There were very few no brainers. You really do need to understand the reason each answer is correct from your studies.
Further, I feel that there was a lot of material not represented in the QAE database that was on the test.
By the time I was half way through the exam I was seriously doubting my decision to rely on the database only.

Fortunately I have pretty good experience across the domains and relied on that in making educated choices.
I had 40 questions flagged for review and spent the second 2 hours carefully balancing gut feeling against what I studied.
When I was ready to click "end test" I honestly did not expect to pass. But I did!

Observations and advice:
In taking the practice exams I got pretty good at predicting what my score was going to be. Today I feel like I got an 80%, and I did not think that would be enough to pass. We'll see what the final score is.
If I could start over I would have devoted some time to studying the task statements and also would have taken advantage of some other study mediums like Cybrary to close some gaps.

I am thankful to all those that posted experiences and advice here. It gave me hope and was very helpful. All of that advice was pretty much on target.
You wont pass the test by memorizing answers to the QAE and your QAE scores don't matter (except in your head).

I am trying to "give back" by sharing my experience here. Hope it helps others!

Good Luck in pursuing your CISM Certification!

Span

Well done! Now relax and enjoy and a cold one.